The Petch House

ListWise

Monday, June 13, 2005

Remember how Lucy used to cry in the old “I Love Lucy” shows. Ricky would come home from the club and Lucy and Ethel would be caught in some hair-brained scheme and Ricky would say, “Lucy! You’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do!” Then Lucy would look into the camera with her mouth wide open and go, “Waaaaaaa!” That was me today. I’m Lucy.

Here’s what happened. It all started about 80 years ago. When my house was converted in to apartments they took two of the grand openings between the parlors and reduced them to single door openings. When they did this they took the existing casing and sawed it down to fit the new, smaller opening. Now fast forward 80 years. I opened the space back up but I needed new casing to fit the wider opening. So, off to the mill I went and at great expense had new casing custom milled. The old, shorter casing was fine and the plan has always been to use it in other areas of the house. I forgot about the fact that this old, smaller casing, which has been stored in the attic, is drenched in layers and layers of paint. I need to install some of it in the kitchen and that means MORE PAINT STRIPPING!!!!. I have to do 2 plinth blocks, a header, and 2 sides. The corner blocks are new reproductions so they are fine.

Here’s how it went in my head as I walked down from the attic.

Ricky: “Lucy! You’ve got some strippin’ to do!”

Lucy: “Waaaaaa! But Ricky I don’t want to.

Ricky: “Damn it, Lucy! You start strippin’ dat paint right now or I’m gonna’ beat the hell out of you!”

Lucy: “No Ricky, don’t hit me again. I’ll do it, I swear. Waaaaaaa!”

(I don’t remember I Love Lucy being so violent, but this is the 21st Century)

3 comments:

Ok just don't start getting into the "Lucy" thing to much. I picture you (funny that I can do that even though I don't know what you look like) up in your attic with a scarf on your head. You keep applying the stripper but layer after layer of paint keeps appearing or some other mad cap woodworking adventure.